Abnormal Psychology : The Problem of Maladaptive Behavior

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This classic book provides readers with a comprehensive and up-to-date real-world overview of the abnormal psychology field, by building on the strengths of existing theoretical systems and clinical methods. It focuses on maladaptive behavior as a product of the interaction between personal vulnerabilities and resiliencies.Numerous brief cases include first-person accounts that illustrate the experience of mental illness, as well as the nature and challenges of clinical practice and clinically-relevant research.For individuals interested in the fields of abnormal psychology, abnormal behavior, and psychopathology.

Authors who revise textbooks face many decisions: What to add or change? What to retain? What to delete or cut back? We considered these questions in four domains:conceptual framework, clinical material, research,andpedagogy.Each is very important for students in Abnormal Psychology courses. A coherent conceptual approach provides the organizing principles needed to understand complex subject matter. Clinical case material is crucial because, after all, real people with real problems are what the field is all about. Research is central to the study of maladaptive behavior because new evidence has a great influence over how we understand people with problems. Pedagogy is critical for presenting material in a clear, engaging way that will hold students' interest. Framework of the Eleventh EditionWe continue to believe in an interactional view of abnormal behavior, and recent research has provided additional support for this view. People have problems because of interactions involving their own personal attributes and the situations and challenges they confront in life. We emphasize the personal contributors because of the growing evidence that what we bring to life situations (our vulnerabilities) and our ability to bounce back from reverses and roadblocks (our resiliency) have a lot to do with disorders, treatments, and clinical outcomes. However, clinical work involves the analysis of interactions beyond those between the person and the situation. It is also necessary to consider interactions among psychological, biological, and cultural processes. Researchers and clinicians are increasingly focusing on these interactions, because of mushrooming evidence concerning their importance for several conditions--particularly anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and schizophrenia. For too long, it had been believed by many that biology drives almost everything, and that biological defects always underlie maladaptive behavior. While we emphasize the role of biological determinants wherever they are pertinent (and they are proving to be pertinent to more and more disorders), we also emphasize the growing evidence that the environment can have major impacts on biological processes (for example, how the brain functions). Finally, there is also growing evidence that treatment often requires a combination of treatment elements (for example, medication and psychotherapy) for optimal outcomes. Clinical MaterialThe more we teach Abnormal Psychology classes, the more we appreciate the value of case material to students. Accounts of real people--with their vulnerabilities, resiliencies, and situational challenges--bring abnormal psychology alive. The saying, "A good picture (or example) is worth a thousand words" is often quite correct. For this reason, we have increased the number of cases that we use to illustrate abnormal behavior, and we have used cases in several different ways. Some cases, such as the three extensive therapy cases that open Chapter 3, illustrate clinical principles and raise conceptual issues to which we refer throughout the chapter. We also includeCase StudyandFirst Personboxes that help students gain empathy for the personal experiences of maladaptation and deviancy. Finally, the many brief case examples throughout the text also aid students in understanding and remembering key characteristics of the disorders discussed. In many instances we have used relevant examples from recent events reported in the media to enhance student interest and to emphasize the reality of the problems discussed. ResearchResearch lets us know when clinical roads previously taken lead nowhere, and when there are new roads that should be explored further. With each edition of this book, we have been impressed by the knowledge explosions that continue to occur in the field of abnormal psychology. For example, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)